


A Space Immortal in Posession of Megalomania Must Be in Want of a Cult

by Oak_Leaf



Category: The Mechanisms (Band)
Genre: Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Cults, Ficlets, Gen, Humor, Originally Posted on Tumblr, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, character death but it's The Mechs so you know; they get better
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-28
Updated: 2020-05-03
Packaged: 2021-03-01 22:01:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,211
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23894245
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Oak_Leaf/pseuds/Oak_Leaf
Summary: The crew of the Aurora have a way of becoming the focus of certain extremist groups.
Comments: 26
Kudos: 97





	1. Raphaella

"Have we been to this world before?"

Ivy squinted, a look that told Jonny she was running down the precisely catalogued contents of her brain to find the file tagged for this current planet, and cross-checking it against the list of previous locations they had visited. The bloody nerd. He, of course, never bothered to remember things, which made him infinitely cooler.

"No," she answered after a moment. "Although we've stopped at 25% of the stars in this system, if you'll recall; Tim blew up the moon of the orbiting neighbor, which set off a chain reaction destabilizinh this world's astroid belt."

Jonny did recall. That had been an all right time. Fun, but less than if they had been able to see the destruction in person. He preferred causing trouble hands-on.

"Why do you ask?" Ivy questioned.

Jonny jerked his head, indicating, and Ivy turned to observe the distinctive bronze statue situated just in the middle of the marketplace where they stood.

"Hm. Well, that could be any woman with wings."

"Holding a beeker in one hand and a scapel in the other? Strapping those pistols? With _that_ expression on her face?"

"Hm." Ivy looked puzzled, which was a refreshing change from her usual face which could best be described as Distantly Distracted But Also Smugly Knowing. She headed off without another word, and Jonny followed, curious.

She approached a set of three stood near the statue and proceeded to question them about. Jonny considered pulling out his revolver to assist with their motivation to answer, but then, they woud probably react badly, and he would have to shoot them--or he might just shoot them to start with, it was hard to resist the temptation when the hammer was under his thumb and the trigger was at his finger--and this was one of the few times he would actually rather hear what people had to say before he fired bullets at them So he hung back apace, making faces at a nearby group of children playing in the shade, who proved themselves interesting by laughing and making faces back at him rather than scaring or being rude. He rooted throuch the pockets of his trousers to see if he had any candy he might throw them, and had begun to consider the prospect of finding a sweets store to rob instead, when Ivy finished with her interregation and returned to him.

"It seems," she informed him, "that statue is a depiction of a local deity known as the Winged Scientist. She first rose to prominence around a century ago, although they couldn't be specific with their dates, when she amassed a devoted following. Their main tenets are discovery, the scientific method, and a disregard for human life while in a pursuit of these. The Winged Scientist embodied all these principles, and according to accounts, also possessed a fine alto singing voice. Since their inception, they have developed small communes throughout their world, and this town is one such place. Current information suggests there is a 98.3% chance that our own science office was the Winged Scientist."

Ah, so the crew of the Aurora or at least Raphaella had been here before, just not _yet_. That explained things.

"I suppose we ought to tell her," Ivy said, looking back up at the statue again.

"Let's think on that, for a moment. She'll definitely let the power go to her head and abuse her position, and her followers will be all to willing to volunteer to help with whatever experiments she's got going on. It will be horrific."

"So, you'll be telling her?"

Jonny grinned, sharp. "Oh, yeah."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Each chapter will be a stand-alone ficlet about a different member of the crew.


	2. Ashes

On a young world–or at least, a world that has become young again, as there is the fragmented dust of civilization that speaks of Someone who had known to build and reach and look up and look forward, but by the time the crew of the Aurora drifted through, the beings that live there are too concerned with whether they would survive the dark and cold night to think much beyond that. Ashes struck a match and burned it down to their fingers, and it would be hard to say if the inhabitants were more in love with the flame they hold or the smirk that it illuminated.

Ashes taught them fire, and the inhabitants taught themselves to keep warm, to cook, to keep light.

Ashes taught them to make burnt offerings, but demanded the best sacrifices be left unburnt. They’d rather touch spark to those themself.

The rest of the crew was surprised when they left that planet and it was not a smoldering, smoking rock. Their quartermaster wiped from their face the soot of their final offering.

“Little present for future Ashes,” they said, smiling with lips black and gray, although that might just have been their lipstick. “Sometimes you want'ta see how a fire burns.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for all the kudos/bookmarks/comments so far, y'all are lovely.


	3. Chapter 3

Ivy Alexandria had not formed a cult. (Cult, the precise definition popped to the forefront of her mind. A religion regarded as unorthodox or spurious. Also: its body of adherents.) 

It would be more accurate to say a cult had formed around her. (Cult: A great devotion to a person, idea, object, movement, or work.)

No religous fervor, merely a sect of like-minded individuals drawn together by a mutual interest. It was hard for Ivy to find people with mutual interests.

Violence and bloodshed was all well and good, but while the rest of the crew relished diving head first into the thick of it, Ivy would much rather observe. She recorded and performed stories; she did not make them. And so when they landed on this planet, the others dispersed with flaring guns and clinking bottles and flashing cards, while Ivy had Brian let her off by a bustling, erudite city full of museums and universities and libraries.

She came upon a tall building amber-lit through its thick windows, full of bent heads and earnest voices, where sound was muffled by the sliding stacks filled with the rubber-like devices this world used for data retension. (Colloquially known as cauchate, developed in this planet's ninth century by unknown.) In this library, Ivy found her following.

"Tell me about about your organizational methods," Ivy asked the librarians. They told her. She frowned and suggested better techniques.

"What has been the most valuable technological advancement over the last century?" Ivy asked a table of academics. They told her. She asked more details, and spent the next two hours in discussion with them, mentally noting what she learned to be properly archived later. 

"Your knowledge of post-pre-modern warfare appears lacking. Have you studied the military tactics of Queen George the seventh?" Ivy asked a cluster of researchers when she overheard their discussion. They had not heard of Queen George the seventh. She enlightend them, and they took in her words hungrily.

So it went. There was more in the city to experience and discover than the library, but Ivy found herself returning to this spot on the regular. Before long, there were groups waiting for her, eyes lighting up at her entrance. It was an exchanging of knowledge, and she gained as much as they, but it would be pointless for her to deny the way her band of scholars gathered around her as she sat, like students to a teacher. (Title: _Plato's Academy_. Type: Artwork. Media: mosaic. Artist: unknown. Era: First century BCE Terran standard measurement. Origin: Pompeii, Italy, Europe, Earth, the Sol system.)

That all ended when Ashes burned down the library. Not intentionally. It just happened to be on a street of buildings that went up when the wind blew sparks from a bank that Ashes, Jonny, and Nastya had set on fire while robbing.

Still, the library burned, and as one of the heavy shelving units fell over and pinned her to the smoldering floor, Ivy had the thought, _Not another one, not again, not again_.

After they dug her out from the soot and rubble, she didn't speak to Ashes for three decades.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Do you ever think about how Ivy used to be an actual archivist out of the library of Alexandria, and then feel things about that? Anyway, I love her, but I had a hard time w/her characterization, so this is the best I could manage.


	4. Chapter 4

The Toy Soldier did not start a cult. It is really more the sort to join them, and join them it did. Many different ones, across many worlds and galaxies and times, and it has had a jolly good time with all of them! Why, one time when its friends had lost it again (they managed to lose it so often, silly friends!), the Toy Soldier drifted about from army to army to oligarchal serfdom for a good 50 years, before it found itself on a supply shuttle headed for a dwarf planet that had become the commune for the Righteous Church of the Holy Gun. 

There, it was handed new clothes, which the Toy Soldier obligingly hung over its wooden frame, happy to match its new comrades. It then stood to attention, listening for its next instructions.

It didn't have long to wait. A pair hurried the Toy Soldier off, murmuring how it would have the honor to meet _him_. If it was lucky, they said, he would approve and it would be allowed to stay. If not, well...

They gave the Toy Soldier a tray holding a glass and bottle of whiskey to deliver, and sent it in. With a sharp salute, the Toy Soldier opened the double doors and stepped into the chamber to meet the Righteous Church's Captain.

Two shots fired out, splintering the Toy Soldier's chest and sending liquer and glass eveey which way. It glanced down at the shards of wood that peeked out through the holes in its new clothes. It would need to ask Marius for the repair kit when it found its friends again.

It looked back up, and oh! What luck! There was one of its friends now!

Sprawled across a metal aproximate of a throne, one leg bent over the arm of the seat and two smoking revolvers in either hand, was Jonny. He had his head tipped back and eyes closed.

"Hullo!" the Toy Soldier called.

Jonny's eyes popped open. "Shit." He fired two more rounds. The Toy soldier lifted the tray it had brought, moving it out of the line of fire although the damage had already been done.

Jonny cursed again. "How did _you_ get here? Wait." He sat up. "How _did_ you get here? Did the others come crawling back to give me the respect I deserve?"

The Toy Soldier hasn't seen the others since they accidentally shot it into deep space through the trash shoot, it told Jonny. 

"Ah, right. I remember that. That was fun," he said, holstering his guns. 

"Did You Also Get Ejected Out Of The Trash Shoot, Jonny?"

"No! A crew doesn't throw its captain out with the rubbish! I was tired of you lot, so I struck out on my own. Of my own free will. And Nastya definitely didn't blungeon me with a ratchet and leave my corpse in a gutter because I called the stupid ship a rust bucket. That didn't happen."

"Whatever You Say, Jonny!" The Toy Soldier approached and offered the tray. He did not seem interested, so it took the drink instead, bringing the broken cup to splash whiskey and chips of glass against the painted smile of its mouth.

Jonny made a face. "God, you're creepy. Well, I'll let you stay for now--for _now,_ just don't tell any of that lot out there you got shot. They get real weird about that kinda thing, think surviving 'baptistism by bullets' means you a god or something." 

The Toy soldier saluted. "Right-o!"

That day and after, it followed Jonny as he went about his business. Ranting at the people in the matched clothes and shooting at them and sitting in his chair and demanding things brought to him. Normal Jonny things like that. At several points, he would give speeches with lines that the Toy Soldier recognized from one of their shows. He was acting just like he did when he sang as that poor preacher chap who fell into the sun. How clever!

It was a grand time! Jonny would give orders, and the Toy Soldier would obey. It was a lot like the ship in that way, except here, with the people in the matching clothes, the others actually listened to him.

They listened to Jonny until they stopped. A smart looking woman who had worn the matching clothes decided she was a better fit to wield the Holy Gun, and it seemed everyone agreed with her. 

A command is a command is a command, and so the Toy Soldier gave its salute and joined the group sent to storm Jonny went he sat napping. Several dozen or so emptied pistols was just enough to keep him quiet until the Toy Soldier had dragged him onto the trash barge as ordered, and the barge had been launched away from the commune and off into space.

"What Excitement, Huh, Jonny?" the Toy Soldier asked brightly as it stood by where Jonny was coming back to himself.

"You will not tell the others about this," he growled, "and as soon as we find the Aurora, I'm giving you to those freaky cats to use as a scratching post."

"Sounds Good, Jonny!


End file.
